Klodnicki Clobbers Eastern Regional Day 3 Competition

If you’ve been following our coverage of the WSOP Circuit’s Eastern Regional Championship, then you know that the tournament has already been rife with surprise eliminations and dramatic reversals of fortune. Chris Bell went into today’s Day 3 competition in the lead, but he experienced the same roller coaster ride as the Day 2 leader (Vanessa Selbst) before him.

True to the consistent tone of this first nail-biting Eastern Regional Championship, the match-ups were big and dramatic right to the end. Matthew Waxman, who claimed the Main Event prize just a week ago, had a second WSOP Circuit title within reach. Only 20 minutes from the end of Day 3, Waxman doubled up off chip leader Klodnicki.

A few hands later, though, Waxman’s luck ran short when Chris Bell sent him to the rail in 10^th place. Bell picked the young hopeful off with pocket queens against Waxman’s own unimproved pocket nines. Bell’s acquisition of Waxman’s newly improved stack powered his own chip count up to the number two position.

Going out in 11^th was the last lady pro in contention, the Eastern Regional’s own comeback kid Beth Shak. At one point in the tournament, Klodnicki was actually nearing the million chip mark, having taken more than 300,000 chips off an unlucky Frank Calo, who ended his regional run in 14^th place. Calo’s promising A-K fell to Klodnicki’s A-5 suited in the most unfortunate of ways – when Klodnicki paired his 5 on the flop and Calo failed to draw anything at all.

Here’s the rundown on the last nine men standing (or should we say sitting?) going into the final table action tomorrow: 

1. Chris Klodnicki – 759,000
2. Chris Bell – 706,000
3. Micah Raskin – 594,000
4. Jason Burt – 579,000
5. Ketan Pandya – 377,000
6. Nick Mitchell – 332,000
7. Todd Terry – 307,000
8. Andy Frankenberger – 230,000
9. Seth Fischer – 219,000

It’s been a solid run for all the players, but Klodnicki, Burt and Mitchell have been at the front of the pack since Day 1. The boys will take to the final table tomorrow at 11am; if you want to beat us to the punch, then you can catch live updates from the last day’s action at the WSOP website. To reiterate, at stake is a $358,295 top prize plus one of the first four Regional Champion rings and a guaranteed seat at the National Championship next May.

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